When we originally reviewed the BlackBerry PlayBook, the two biggest strikes against it were the lack of native email, calendar and contacts along with a lack of compelling apps in BlackBerry Word. PlayBook 2.0 addresses the native messaging and information management gap in a big way, with what I think is a pretty awesomely-implemented solution, including oodles of social integration. And with more time to get apps on the platform and the introduction of the Android App Player in 2.0, the app gap is closing too (of course there are still some big titles like Skype, Netflix and Kindle that we're waiting to see appear in App World).

OS 2.0 brought with it a lot more than the above -- our full walk through is coming soon -- and overall I'm pretty happy with the update (I voted Loving It! Go #TeamBlackBerry). Yes, there are still plenty of things I'd like to see (which I'll point out in my full review coming next week once I have spent more quality time on 2.0), but knowing 2.0 isn't the end game but part of the bigger journey into BlackBerry 10 puts it into perspective. As was discussed in our interview with Michael Clewley from RIM's PlayBook team yesterday, PlayBook OS 2 provides the foundation for BlackBerry 10, which is an entirely new platform that RIM is migrating over to. There are a lot of services that RIM still has to bring over from BBOS to the PlayBook OS/BlackBerry 10 and we know there's a lot more still to come (like native BBM on the PlayBook).

Putting aside the fact we know there's more to come, we want to see what you think of PlayBook OS 2.0 as it stands right now. Vote on the poll above and let us kow in the comments! Oh yeah, and if you don't yet own a PlayBook, be sure to enter here for your chance to win one!

BUY IT FROM ME RIGHT NOW and pay in installment if you want.
Brand new still have the plastic on the screen.chlorideshift@yahoo.com
# don't get me wrong I'm a die hard fan of blackberry and boughtPB just before the OS2 was coming out but RIM does it again disappointed with the it.i know there are no more updates in the future.pls I'm not kidding.if you want pls shoot an email to me.
Have been using BB way before kevin.

I agree and both of you are on the right track. I'm just getting tired of all these people hating for ridiculous reasons. RIM is going a whole new direction in terms of OS software and we have to accept that we are on the trial and error stage of this and we can help make it better with honest and reasonable feedback. Nothing against Apple because I own a few of their products too but when they made the iPad it is a big ole clone of the iPhone. Yes we can argue that there are some differences but for casual users the differences are mundane at best. I boo'ed RIM for not releasing this software from the beginning but I applaud them for making it right and continuing to make it better. At least they have not tried to screw us over and make us buy a Playbook 2 to get to this point or beyond.

I like the idea of the native contact app and all the social integration. But I think it is a bit slow. After linking with my facebook, twitter and linkedin accounts and a few of my internet email accounts ... the app became very slow. When I tap on a contact name on the left, the right pane gray out for approx 3 seconds before it will refresh with the info.... and it seems to be doing on-the-fly lookup of that contact person to try to find a match on LinkedIn (which is a good feature to have) ... but I think we need this app to be more responsive. Right now, it is too sluggish imho.

I agree with you, it is painful to use the PIM apps when they lag like this. What I have an even bigger problem with is App World. I like the new UI, but it's slow and buggy and lacks many features that should have been available from day one.

Mine was sluggish too (calendar, email and especially contacts) BUT NOT after a restart! Once you do that, it will be it's old snappy self again, at least mine is. I had well over 2000 contacts for it to sync. Tap the battery icon and select restart or just hold the power button, the + and - buttons on top of your PlayBook simultaneously.

I have no complaints now. It's usable, portable and officially my mobile office now

Adobe needs to be able to open more than one document at a time in order to be used to its full potential.

Twitter/Facebook needs a facelift and more useful on PB.

Editing and sorting of bookmarks...a must have.

The good...

Native email is awesome with it being so complete, especially with contacts (but see my first point)

Folders on the PB is great and can clean up a screen with ease...I dont like a cluttered screen.

I still havent played much with Docs to GO but Ive heard/read a lot of good things ...

Will be trying the Print to Go soon as well.

Overall, still a way to go with the product but its looking ok. I would love to get rid of the laptop and just carry around my PB for meetings etc but if Adobe cant open more than one doc at a time, my meetings can get tedious. If we can import our BB contacts/calendar to the native side I would be over the moon.

I forgot the BB Bridge remote control as well as the good....can do so much with that for writing/replying long emails, hooking up to the tv for video/surfing and for PPT presentations for meetings. That is cool!

Due to work schedules etc, I haven't had much time to tinker with it. I'm letting the dust settle from all the excitement and hoping to spend some quality time this weekend.

The calendar setup is an interesting issue. I'm not a techie by any stretch so simple works for me. I want to maintain my calendar on my BB. I don't have a BES phone, so any and all appointment content is sent or forwarded to my gmail email. I want to see any changes on my bb calendar to be reflected in the playbook calendar. So far too confusing (on my part) what it can and can't do.

I love the fact you can video chat while tethered. Not as good as Wifi quality but it works!

Kevin, once things settle down, can you have one thread strictly to serve as a tutorial on how to setup the new features? I've had my playbook since launch day and its just become an even better TOOL with OS 2.0!

Loving the remote control and using my BB9900 as a keypad! I hate typing on glass!

RIM, please take the time to pick out some of the great suggestions in here!

I'm loving the update, the only issue I seem to be having deals with viewing my email messages. I can see my Facebook messages back and forth between me and whoever I'm chatting with. The test email I sent myself is visible, both the outgoing and the incoming, however, any other emails I have in my inbox just get stuck on "Downloading Message" and I never see the message. If anyone else has had this issue and resolved it, could you send me a PM telling me what you did? I've restarted, powered down and back up, next I'm going to try a Hard Reset. I'm hoping I don't have to do a security wipe and reload the software, but if that's what it comes to, that's what I'll have to do.

I am having problems with the application that I tried to download yesterday, when I try to open the application it does not respond at all. I rebooted the playbook and still not responding, it happened with 3 different applications. Is anyone else having the same problem???

No East Asian language IME is very disappointing. I have been e-mailing, tweeting to RIM for the importantce of deploying the languages (not just EA) ASAP but never received any response. They should not wait the deployment unitl they actually launch PB at each location. There is no way I can recommend to my Asian friends to purchase PB over iPad for this very reason. I love m PB and 2.0 upgrade was awesome but I'm typing my Japanese on my BB and only use PB for English e-mails... Everything else is pretty much superb over iPad but... What a shame.

I have seen several responses on twitter to questions regarding Asian language support, from Alec Saunders and others. I have also read several posts and listened to a few interviews indicating that it is coming, it just takes time.

Love the improvements and knowing things will get better. I am a little disappointed in the Contacts app - it isn't as intuitive as I would have hoped. I've had to spend a lot of time linking different accounts. Also, not having wifi at work makes print to go a non existent app that could help me.

I spent a few hours last night and a few hours this morning linking accounts as well plus I had to delete a lot of contacts. I wasn't expecting to have enough it load every single FB and Twitter contact. I had to remove a big chunk as I don't care to have everyone on my FB in my contact list. I just wanted the ones I communicate with most. I love the social integration but it would be nice for it to be a bit more intuitive. Oh and also if you can select which contacts you want to import - that would be awesome.

Definitely a huge step in the right direction for RIM. I've seen very few rough edges in 2.0 and I'm really enjoying the added functionality.

Some things I'd hope to see in upcoming OS releases:

1) yes.. BBM... like everyone else... But I clearly understand the challenges in brining this currently device specific app to multiple devices per user. I'm anxious to see how they solve the obvious problems.

2) Work on the video application. Expand compatible formats and PLEASE work on the interface! The picture viwer app allows us to sort images into subdirectories and search/preview them at that level. I've got over 200 videos on my PB, sorted into a dozen or so subdirectories, but to access them I've got to scroll through ALL of them if I'm in the mood for a Zappa music vid :)

3) Printing! We absolutely need to be able to print to wifi/networked printers directly from the PB. Not through "cloud" (ugh.. i HATE that word) services, not through a PC with some connecting application.

Here's one that may be a quick bugfix. When going into standby in OS1.x, it took a swipe from border to opposing border to wake it up... I love that!. Now, when put in standby, simply touching the screen anywhere wakes it up again.. I don't love that.

All in all, I think the PB is now "cookin' with gas" (great job RIM!)... Now it's time to turn up the heat!

My standby still works the same way. My LOCK feature (new with 2.0) does what you say your "standby" does. It also makes me have to use my password to unlock. Don't know what's happened with yours. Try a restart. Maybe that will reset things

I'm almost completely satisfied with the device itself. Camera is a little laggy, and there are a few quirks here and there. I chose the second option not because of the device or the operating system, but because I simply want some of the big name apps from other platforms. I think the playbook is about 5 or 6 apps away from being a serious competitor for the "best tablet" prize.

Skype, Hulu, Netflix, Kindle, and a couple more, maybe?

At any rate, not having those apps isn't a deal-breaker, but until the PlayBook can compete in the realm of apps, for a majority of consumers it just won't matter what kind of device or operating system it has.

I'm loving the fact that overnight, my Playbook became more useful, and not just a place to play games. All of a sudden, I am dragging it around with me rather than my HP TouchPad, which is a pretty rockin device (with all things considered)
Im loving the fact that, it is now, finally my work device, that I can take out on the road with me and be fully connected. Thanks RIM... It was a long time coming, but well worth the wait...

Ya know, I would like Skype, and I don't need a native BBM, just the ability to have BBM Groups. As for a lot of the things that others have mentioned, they would be great, but every other tablet has them. The PB needs to jump ahead of them, not do what they already do.
I am very happy with the update, it really makes me proud to own a PB, but this can't be the end. As they say in Meet the Robinsons, "keep moving forward".

I kid. I kid. Anyhoo, love it , but I want more. I would love to see more TAT love with the UI as well as the native apps such as FB and the media player; I think eventually that will happen. Moreover, I am hoping the big time apps will arrive in App World pretty soon. Mobile World Congress would be a great time to showcase all of those. I will be really content with the addition of Zinio which has been coming soon for a bit now. We are somewhat closer to it actually being on the PB. I hope. In the end, well done RIM. Cannot wait for the next big update now.

I love the new OS.. BlackBerry Remote is too sick. Even Gizmodo for once gave a fair review. Only thing we need are some major apps... PLEASE RIM JUST PAY MICROSOFT TO MAKE A SKYPE APP, AMAZON FOR A KINDLE APP and NETFLIX App!!! PLEASE I NEED SKYPE!

I take my PlayBook everywhere with me. I showed off the new OS to my friends at work. They loved it. 2 of them went out and bought a PlayBook. First thing people ask is does it have Skype. Even the HP TouchPad has Skype. End of my rant.

P.S. I know its not RIM's problem with the Apps its the developers, but all I am saying RIM should do a Microsoft and just pay developers. I STILL LOVE MY PLAYBOOK. I SOLD MY iPAD CUZ IT WAS COLLECTING DUST!!

It's definitely a step in the right direction, but there's still a long way to go.

First and foremost, we NEED netflix. The PS Vita has been out for only a few short days and already has it. Literally (almost) everything with a screen has netflix, and the playbook shouldn't be an exception.

Second, there should be a section in app world that shows the apps that are ported from Android. With those apps, I'd like to see some official ones from gmail, google reader, google docs, etc...and maybe even Chrome.

I could not care less about Android apps. I do wish for a way to import Outlook Express contact info without google. And I would REALLY like to print to the printers on my WiFi networks at home and at the office.

2.0 is underwhelming, to say the least. I like the Remote Control feature, though I haven't had much occasion to use it yet, and I really love the predictive keyboard, but that's something that was already available in the beta.

As for the big new features, they feel pretty useless and aren't user-friendly at all. The messages app won't accept my email address without a bunch of information I don't know, and there is no easy way to sync your contacts and calendar from your BB to the contacts and calendar apps on the Playbook (that I can find, anyway).

So far, these hyped-up native apps aren't offering me anything I don't already have. I'm sticking with Kaiten mail to get my messages, which works better than what RIM has developed here, and will continue to use BB Bridge for accessing the calendar.

I don't mind the shortage of apps, there's an app for almost all the things I care about. A few apps I'd like to see: SugarSync, LastPass, TapaTalk, a BlackBerry Podcast app that syncs with my BB app, eBay.

After a bunch of screwing around, I have Google Calendar syncing multiple calendars, I have my Google contacts and email, an Exchange box syncing email and contacts. That's the good. The bad is: no task and memo sync to Google and Exchange! Huge failing.

It would be nice to see "profiles" like on the BB, with the ability to set ringtones per notification type.

Overall I'm very happy with the loads of improvement - except for the BBM support. I realize they don't have native support yet but they could have improved the current implementation to support BBM groups.

I really wanted to vote that I love it, because I really do. Unfortunately the first option also asked it had everything that I wanted. Like so many others, there are a couple of apps that would make it perfect for me. Living in Japan, I need Skype to stay in touch with my family in the States. As far as I know, the biggest shortcomings that I've experienced are mostly out of RIMs control.

I'm seriously considering getting a London when it comes out having never owned a BB device before my PB.

Huge disappointment, BB released PB in middle east since day one and until now no Arabic language support?????!!!!! " Step to the right direction my AZZ" this is the basic of marketing ask yourself what r u targeting??? you targeting a market like middle east without trying to give the obvious basics!!! what the hell U doing RIM?

As a Canadian who supports RIM mainly because they are a Canadian company, I feel like it was a major slap in the face that the video store is not available in Canada. For the first time I will consider other smartphones when I tire of my 9810 and I have been using and supporting RIM devices since the first pager model.

I bought the Playbook on the day it was released and like everything else about the new OS. The additions to the bridge are awesome, print to go has been handy, etc.

With a little tweaking, I was able to get my company email working with MobileIron this morning (we require MobileIron on Android/iOS/Win phones to run ActiveSync).

Content creators must be compensated for their efforts if we want content to be created in the future. Copyright law has to catch up to the web but until it does we'll have to accept the fact that not all content will be released to all countries at the same time because every country has its own set of copyright laws.

I had accumulated quite a few apps and the folders allowed me to organize them much better. I like the Video Store and the Music Store. Not only can I download directly to the device but it is easy to port over stuff from my PC.

The improvement to Video Chat and addition of e-mail, contacts and calendar are nice.

The remote control feature for the Bold is awesome. Love that.

RIM took a great tablet and made it better.

A friend of mine at work liked mine and got one for herself and after 2.0 got another one for her son. I hope this is something that people take advantage of. How can a tablet this good and powerful be selling for 199.00? Especially when you consider that you have free internet access via bridge.

So far, I absolutely hate the update! I cannot get anything to work. Bridge is ridiculously slow! I truly hope there is a way to downgrade the operating system. On a scale of 1 to 10, on how I like the upgrade? I think I am well into the negative. I did not realize one update could cause me to fall out of love with BlackBerry so quickly! If something does not change soon, I am done with BlackBerry

I was looking forward to native mail via activesync. It has it, but it lacks functions available on all other activesync devices. There is no way to enable more folders for push based automatic sync (meaning other than Inbox, Outbox, and Sent Items).

I have subfolders to my inbox. When e-mails come to Outlook, they are filed into the appropriate subfolder based on certain criteria. I can't see these e-mails on the Playbook native app without going into the folder and refreshing. This means I do not get to make use of the Playbook's LED indicator and other features. It makes the mail app less of a primary device and more of a low key app for when I have time device to manually sync each folder.

On Android and Apple I get to choose which folders are push, but not on the Playbook. I will never give up my Blackberry Smartphone, however, when iPad 3 comes out, I think I am heading to Apple for my tablet needs.

Really enjoying it. Only complaint so far is that I haven't been able to use the messages application in portrait orientation (makes typing easier).
I really like the remote control capabilities and the PrintToGo option.

all i can say, i just love this build. it's rock solid, it's fast, the bridge is awesome, the email/calendar/PIM apps are working (almost) flawlessly. BUT.. there are some glitches i've just found:
- how to disable the LED?? i hardly need it actually, i just like the "cling" notification sound, that's so cool!
- when accessing the contact app, after a while (linking/unlinking contact cards or accessing contact info), it's getting laggy
- the messages app: is there any way to separate the inbox?

other else, it's awesome! unlike the iOS 5 which has drained the battery a lot due to a bunch of new features, this OS 2.0 is just.. awesome! i have no problems at all with the battery life. anyways, GREAT JOB RIM, but WE STILL WANT MORE! Skype, WLM, GTalk & Google Maps are a must!!! HIT IT RIM!!!

Been reading everything on this post in case I missed something on 2.0. Answered all email, checked out some movies and bought a filter for my refrig and Tony Bennett's duets off Amazon. Listening to my Pandora.

Still chuckling. At'll do pig, at'll do.

Oh, I forgot, then used RDM+ and got on remote pc to clear up something at the office I didn't get done. Cool, that could have been important.

My biggest gripe is RIM's bread and butter. Convinience. I don't understand why my Blackberry calendar doesn't appear in the Playbook Calendar when synced, Why not have the phonebook populate in the Playbook one as well and why can't I view my Blackberry email in the Playbook email? I don't understand. Is there someone that used to work at RIM that is no longer there that would think of this stuff? When it comes to RIM it always came accross to me as a no brainer. Take your time with the bells and peeps but give me what RIM has always been good with on my Playbook as well...................................sigh

Oh yeah. One more thing. More native apps need to be on this thing. I know that the Android porting stuff is a means to an end. However, native apps are what really shine on the PlayBook. The Android apps work, but there are some hiccups from time to time. Anyhoo, still happy with the 2.0. Just want some of the little things handled better by RIM. Oh, Cascades! I cannot wait for that.

gotta say that while it's okay, i'm underwhelmed. a few things that make sense, such as easy xfer of acconts from a bby smartphone are not there. the email app has no plain text option. and i just generally see no improvement where improvement was needed, such as bookmark sorting. can't see how something not that much better could have taken this long to achieve. if there's any real functional improvement, i haven't found it yet.

it's definitely a leap in the right direction. RIM did a WONDERFUL job with their unified inbox/contacts and its integration with linkedin/fb giving news updates of companies (excellent use for business case) and an easy to digest view of people you're meeting that day, or previous meetings you had. The calendar is brilliant, useful, intuitive and smooth looking. It's a great experience to use.

One thing that i'm still waiting for and that really makes a Blackberry a Blackberry in my opinion is app integration. I want to be able to be looking at my pictures, or a file in the file browser, or a voicenote or a contact, etc. then i want to long-press it, and have an option pop up (or maybe come down from the top) with options like "send it as an e-mail", or "Update to fb", or "Send through BBM", "send contact card", "add to home screen", "cut", "copy", "paste". These are features that are already baked in BB phones and is one of the main reasons I enjoy using BB so much as they make the overall experience much more intuitive and user friendly.

That and native BBM but they can get there when they get there.

Thanks RIM, keep it up

p.s. OH and BRIDGE. Wonderful 2.0 update! So long as it continues to control everything else (ps3, xbox, other tablets) I'm in love.

We need solid useful apps such as travel, hotel, rental car, readers for popular pales and mags. Of course material you of these can be accessed from the browser. Must have native Kindle and full featured pdf reader

I first want to say I love my Blackberry Playbook & my Torch 9800!!! I'm a surefire dyed-in-the-wool Blackberry fan girl. I see great potential in the Playbook. I hope, as I've heard, that someone who works at RIM will read this...

That being said I downloaded OS 2 yesterday morning and have played with it all yesterday and today. While there are many improvements that were needed and did get twinked with and added I'm so disappointed after all the hype and promises that preceeded it that you can't synic your Blackberry phone calendar & contacts directly to your Playbook without uploading them to a cloud or bridging or being part of a company that has Enterprise server.

The first reason we chose to buy Blackberry phones a couple years ago & Playbooks this year was that your data is safe with RIM and not going out on a cloud service... This is a real game changer for me.

It seems that RIM doesn't care about the data of the individual users/buyers of their products. It least that's how this appears to me.

We're RIM's loyal customers/cheering squad... Hey hear us and do something to fix this. Word of mouth by satisfied coustomers/bloggers/Facebookers is great PR! Give us a reason to cheer you on and not jeer RIM like the majority of the media has and is doing! We stand up for RIM/Blackberry over and over again all the time... Give us hope that what we believe Blackberry can do and be is a reality, not a pipe dream.

I am loving the new OS 2.0 but I have one big complaint. Why is it that when I set up my email account and set the leave email on the server to ON it deletes the email from the server? This is a big problem for me for because if I delete the email from my Playbook I won't get it on my work computer. I have had to delete the email account from my Playbook until RIM fixes this problem. This is very disappointing because I really like the Playbook. If Android and Apple can get this right why can't RIM?

It was a bit frustrating trying to set up an already existing email however, love the layout and using my 9900 as a remote keyboard was interesting - just have to play with it more. Overall I think it's got lots of potential and it's fun playing with it too!

First let me say there is no bigger blackberry fan than me! So much so I was even going to approach blackberry about being their spokesperson. Further, I'm President and CEO of a marketing company so I know a little something about marketing. I have 6 smartphones on my desk right now (1 iphone, 2 android, 1 web os, 2 blackberrys) and hands down my blackberry torch 9810 beats all the competition!

However the playbook does not even come close to the competition, not even the Kindle Fire and certainly not Asus eee transformer or even ipad (and I can't stand apple)!

It pains me to say the playbook and 2.0 upgrade is a massive failure. I'm a tech head and the new calendar, email and contacts is too complicated for the average tablet user and too glitchy. In order to gain market share, the average tablet user or potential user will get frustrated with using the playbook.

I was excited about the 2.0 upgrade until I got it. Aside from a few bells and whistles, it just added stuff it should have already had and all the other tablets already have had for well over a year.

Further there is no Pandora, no rhapsody, no netflix! Why would I pay $3.99 per video rental on the playbook when I can pay $8.99 a month for unlimited videos on Netflix. Makes no sense!

If BlackBerry wants to blow the competition out of the water they need to contact me and I would put together a marketing plan that would put them back on top in less than 12 months!

The playbook at this point should be be a side note not a headliner!

It may seem as if I'm not in blackberrys corner but I am and it frustrates the h*ll out of me to see the company spiral into a technology abyss when they were the leader for years!!!

I am a little disappointed with the OS 2.0 update. I do love the changes don't get me wrong this update is in the right direction i was jut hoping for more android apps. I understand they are coming soon. But is it out of the question to at least to tell us what android apps are coming out. So we could at least get excited about potentially good game or app that is going to be released ,or i would like even a list or something to tell us what is coming out android or not. I got my playbook the day it was released, and I have been running around showing all of my friends and family all the great things my playbook can do. The problem is when I do tell them I always had to say android apps are coming and the next update is going to be great. I thought i had to wait till summer then got disappointed and had to wait till the near end of February. Even so i have been rooting for blackberry like nobody's businesses. i bought the new bold when it came out and i am happy with it. I don't love it anymore because it just a cleaner 6.1 with some of the same flaws. Some of the big issues that needs to be dealt with is the slowness of App world. Is it just me or is it slow as hell sometimes. I fell like lately a lot of my updates took multiple times to do because it keep freezing before it was done and it had to close it. this was before the os 2.0 though so that issue could have been resolved . To me it still feels sluggish compared to its competitors. Both on phone and on the playbook. I am tried of tell ppl who have blackberrys that say "I wish i had an app that does etc" most of the time ppl will say an app that blackberry already have. I hope the marketing improves because most ppl dont know much about anything. So i have to be like yea they have that app u can get it from app world. Most ppl dont know there is even an app world for there blackerry. Most times the apps are not as good or even are slow most of the time and even sometimes they take awhile to load. The playbook fixes the load times mostly and the QNX is awesome. The point is i have been waiting for RIM now for years to do something special with QNX but still waiting. the new O.S 2.0 is hardly to get excited about because it was promised since released and now months later its here and the tablet is now complete. But now i am waiting again for something new because there still stuff to be done. I checked crackberry everyday since i got my playbook hoping for the OS 2.0 release. Now like i said its good but not great. I played with the new remote functionality which is awesome for like 20mins then got bored. i feel like the browers is a bit faster but checkerboards more than it did before. there still tweaks for it to be done. RIM needs to fix some of these features for blackberry 10 or i am migrating to a company that doesnt just promise and show cool features,but when the do come its late, or they are just average at best when u actually try use it. I am from jamaica and i am telling u this is an island full of blackberry users. Now when i listen to the same ppl talk they want to switch. So RIM needs to do something great if they want to keep the interest.

I'm still hoping for Skype and Kindle for PB, although I'm not going to get all sulky over the matter.

One very small change I was hoping for was the action of the message/email waiting icon [top left corner]. When I see an email icon with a red star on it, I have a pretty good idea what it means. I _don't_ need to see a popup bubble that tells me 'touch here to open email' that I have to touch AGAIN. This just seems silly...

Since the 2.0 update my playbook has become buggy... Dead space no longer works and my bbm doesn't work I keep getting this error "Your version of BlackBerry Messenger is not compatible with BlackBerry Bridge. Download the latest version of BBM to use it on your PlayBook" Which is bizarre considering iv downloaded the latest bbm. Can someone help :(

If I could choose between 1.0x, 2.0 Beta, and 2.0.0.7971, I'm leaning towards the beta. And here's why:

1. Since upgrading to 2.0.0.7971, I now know that the native email app is much more feature-laden than the Bridge apps, but it's largely useless to me because I'm on a BES, and so the only options I have for native email are POP or IMAP, neither of which support contact or calendar sync -- and after getting spoiled with my contacts, calendar, tasks, and memos syncing automatically OTA, there's no way I'm gonna suffer through waiting 'til I'm within Bluetooth range of my laptop before I can sync all that stuff -- a major reason for buying the PB was to be able to use it as often as possible as a replacement for my laptop, not as an additional weight in my laptop bag. (The lappy gets awfully shaken up traveling via saddlebag as well; I'd love to be able to leave it behind whenever possible.) So without readily-synced contacts, etc., the native mail app is really just a tease; a mocking, coquettish hint at what could be -- kind of like the entire history of the PB OS! And now I'm reading posts on other threads which state that the only way I'm gonna be able to connect over ActiveSync is by upgrading the server from BESX to BES, which is beaucoup bucks, and then add Fusion on top of that, which costs even more!
2. The Android subsystem/player/emulator in .7971 is way less stable than it was in the beta. The primary sideloaded apps I used reliably in the beta now crash much more often; one of them (Words with Friends; not anything business-oriented) is completely unusable.

Those are the two biggest features of the Playbook in terms of making it a tablet worth anything, especially for business use: Mail/Calendar/Contacts and Android support. And the mail just makes me sad, while the Android works worse than ever. So far, for me, these two failures more than outweigh the pluses of. 7971: the improved keyboard, the mostly gimmicky Bridge remote (especially for someone who, like me, owns a Storm; a BlackBerry without a physical keyboard), the somewhat more pervasive (but still neither bridged nor configurable) Autocorrect, the stereo bluetooth support, the integration of all those damned social services -- in which I have less than no interest, and whatever else I'm forgetting. (Oh, I remember what I'm forgetting: the completely useless GPS in. 7971. It was sketchy at best before, but now it literally will not lock in for me in any GPS-enabled app, even if I stand outside in the middle of a field for 10 minutes.)

Consarn it, RIM, you've released another disappointment after what the markets seem to feel was a fatally long delay. What a drag.

Good work so far RIM, but don't keep us waiting for the next update. I am a new customer so don't lose me, I want to stick around and support you.

RIM, lobby hard to bring the key Apps, don't need to mention them.

USB-OTG! Get with the program, get it on the tablet! Why are we still waiting???????? Then I can truly leave my laptop at home.

Also, FLAC is open, so get it on the playbook. Why must we wait for this????? How hard can it be????

Let us buy AC3 support if you won't. Why was this not included on a premium tablet?????

Do this as you go, don't wait, before the tablet gets superseded - it is already a year old.

That will just about do it for me. Oh and continue to improve the existing functionality, eg file manager, music player, adobe reader, keyboard etc which are all very basic and could be made a lot better. Keep improving the browser - I would like different zoom levels with text reflow, easier on the eyes for example.

I would really like to have the ability to take photos at a lower resolution - say 640 x 480 - so I could replace the digital camera I must use for inspections. This would allow me to replace another gadget and work more efficiently in the field.
High resolution photos are fine for one off's but are horrible in volume. Even my 8300 had this capability.

I didn't have any wild expectations of the update and I loved the PlayBook as it was so I'm pretty happy right now. However there are a few things I don't like:

- What was once a lovely, smooth user experience is now buggy and laggy.
- I really dislike the Android player. I'm glad there are more apps available, but I really wish that developers would get with the BB platform because right now the glitchy, clumsy interface just does not fit with my impressions of and experience with the PlayBook up to now.
- I find the PlayBook sexy as hell. So while I think adding the numbers to the keypad is helpful, they are far too big and bright and prominent to be aesthetically pleasing. Having the @ and numbers shift positions and appear and disappear with no real logic is also annoying.
- The remote feature seems cool as a novelty but I probably won't bother with it too much, if at all.
- Bridge worked flawlessly for me so I could take or leave the whole native apps deal. I also prefer the security offered with the bridge. I do like the native calendar more though.

Overall I'm fine with the update. Aside from the lag, nothing was lost. However, there was WAY too much hype surrounding the update and I'm left feeling like it's really not that big a deal. The PlayBook is still a super sexy beast though.

Nice update, but not good enough for Outlook users; Cannot take advantage of native contact or calendar. Need to have a simple way to sync Outlook contacts and calendar, using BlackBerry Desktop Manager would be fine.

I am a simpleton who does not ask for much. All I wanted was a device for e-mails and other messages, and a browser to access my on-line books. I bought the PB because because it was small enough to be stuffed into my pocket. So the refreshingly brisk browser function associated with the new OS is just the ticket for me. Throw in integrated message functionality - well, I am ecstatic. Any other goodies are just gravy on the side.

I do love my Playbook OS2
(I was up in the wee hours of 4am pst, but no OS2, then woke up again at 5:30am OS2!, it is downloading... sleep again for a bit.)
Yes, I am loving it (mostly).

Sorry though gang, waiting all this time for stuff that should have been in there in the first place...

No really though, I do love my Playbook (even with OS1) - some even more extra snazzle though would have been nice with OS2 to compensate for the general lack in OS1.(see bottom) [lots of rumors about what OS2 was going to have, but it appears they were just rumors on the most part.]

The PrintToGo was a nice idea (kind of), but where is PrintToCome? P2G is basically a PDF print conversion sent/pushed to the Playbook - useful for... Now a DocSend (DocToGo is taken) would have made a lot of sense - pushing over any document (eg, something, ie doc/pic/etc., gets zipped, sent, unzipped, placed into an appropriate assigned folder). Obviously a print from any Playbook app requires an OS implementation.

Did they appropriate and stuff in somebodies file manager? (reminds me of Windows early days, Win2/3, they integrated Norton Utilities - bare bones version, calling it their own)

NOPE, I don't like the new desktop - they took away Favorites, etc.. I was led to believe they were enhancing this with an ability to make new and renameable desktop folders with sort capability. Yes you can move app icons around to 3+ areas, but it is a move and not a copy - if you move an icon that was in section 1 to section 3, you no more will have it in section 1 (use to be 'ALL', not anymore - happy hunting). I wanted to make many many desktop folders, categorizing my apps. If you keep dragging/moving an app icon to the right (of the last folder) the Playbook will add another desktop folder (I made 7 before I quit playing with it)(it removes empty desktop folders). The move/drag is a bit touchy at the end, you can't go more than half way to the right to make new folder (or else it lets go of the icon and you have to start over again).

The browser is more stable (not crashing at the 5th tab, etc.). Why did we have to wait for that? But then it seems to be a bit more sluggish.

The camera got some new tricks - nice.

The screen keyboard will show numbers on the main alpha panel when in a password entry. So why did you stop there RIM! arrow keys are desperately needed!!!! (try poking around with big or even average fingers to get the cursor to land at where you want it to - argh!). What about copy/paste buttons! This tap/hold thing seems to be an art to get the pop up to show - argh! (they did improve it a bit).

There is a new intuitive quick word (Feedback) and auto complete and spell check. Fairly nice and impressive - hoping it works out for most. So far it is only in the email manager, but I think it is extendable to other apps.

Still only 5 minutes max on screen timeouts (!?) - what is so hard to change that people! ? (I was pointing this out to Blackberry support way back, and they were actually arguing with me that it is not necessary - as I was watching a Blackberry produced dev streaming video on the Playbook (that kept blacking out), that are each about an hour long - so there you are poking at the playbook 12 times at minimum in an hour to keep it going - somebody has a bug up there something.)(I did not check it out, but maybe they fixed it so that any non-idle visual process held the screen timeouts.)

The email manager implementation is nice (I have a POP3, Gmail, Yahoo, and a couple others - Yahoo won't stay connected though). We are all saying how nice, but then this should have been in OS1 (or at least an entry version).

Calendar is a nice top rate implementation.

Music app didn't get the equalizer I heard about - doesn't look like anything new.

Google maps works now in the browser, mostly (the load message now goes away, and it becomes usable). There is no map zoom gesturing for Google Maps, and certain web pages (including Google/Bing Maps) won't allow page zoom gesturing (presumedly those web pages with maps and the sort - it did get a little wildly deciding what was going to zoom with OS1 browser). That means though that on Google Maps you have to try and peck at the tiny + and - icons to zoom map. Bing maps does do finger gesture zoom on their map, and they do rotate as well (interesting). (note I did get Google Maps webpage to do a browser page zoom (probably wasn't finished loading), which then it promptly got stuck there - had to close down). Note: I just discovered that you can on Google Maps do a 3 finger zoom/pan which will probably mess the page up (because it is a bit too sensitive). But then I notice that the Google map will then do a 2 finger gesture zoom if you can get the page to come out right. Since it is very difficult to control I am assuming it is a bug side effect.

Again, I do love my Playbook - even more snazzle would have been nice of course, but thanks RIM for hanging in there to give us OS2. Now if you could really WOW us in OS3 (or more like OS2.5 in a few short months) and then take over the world!

I like the new features, for the most part. But, OS2 seems buggy. Updates from AppWorld involving large files won't download successfully (a small one did). Battery life is much worse. And upon booting up, after entering in the password, the system just hung (a hard reboot got it working again). Unless something went wrong with my specific OS2 install (from Beta OS2), which is a possibility, I'd say there are some annoying bugs that RIM needs to fix quickly.

While there are still a few issues which i know can be sorted out with minor updates, everything else is just great, i love the keyboard and the general smoothness of the playbook now, no freezing and everything just works well, especially on the android side of things.

As an audiophile however, i have noticed a serious reduction in the audio quality the playbook pumps out, especially noticeable running A2DP headphones, the sound is just not as balanced and smooth as it was before the update, seems noisy and harsh, i work with audio for a living, so maybe not many people would notice this.

One thing however that has worn my patience thin is the battery life, the beta had improved battery life and could run me a whole day as a heavy user, now this thing is just sucking the juices away. So now i have my 9900 and playbook both of them sucking away, now this is the only thing i've ever complained about as i genuinely love my gear, simply because i can't get enough love from them in 24 hours without having to plug them in, what happens during those days i'm seriously mobile?

Blackberry did an awesome job!!!! Love everything about it!!! I also love the fact that blackberry still have more then enough give to this technology seeking world! Next Big update's going to be centered around bbm! I am certain!

Is it too much to ask a direct sync between my BB PIM and Playbook?? Even via Bluetooth! I dont think it should be mandatory to pass through Google services to do this! I want to enter an appointment on my BB and find it on my PB calendar :)

Hi all. New member. Gotta say a little disappointed with the app availability. Tried to download 12 of the apps I'm using on another device and only 2 were available. Seems to be an ongoing shortcoming of this platform. The other upgraded / new features are great. Can't beat Playbook for the surfing experience. More apps to come???? Hope so.

so far so good. still waiting for more android apps in app world. this has been a little painful. looking for a better pdf reader comparable to good reader on ipad. one suggestion was repligo reader. forums say that this is available for the playbook however I have been unable to get in app world. same with google maps, words with friends and some others. still waiting for a better cross platform video conferencing app like skype or tango. very very disappointing that these are still unavailable. there was a lot of hype about getting android apps, however I have yet to see many of the higher demand ones become available in blackberry app world which is very frustrating considering when I updated to os2.0 I assumed these would be available. native email, contacts, and calendar are solid with good features as is new blackberry bridge features, however the still lack of high demand quality apps is still a major issue. hopefully soon they will be more uploaded to app world but as of now I am not holding my breath as I believe we were slightly mislead into believing many of these android apps would be immediately available after the os2.0 upgrade which just didn't happen. if playbook wants to be a truly competetive tablet force RIM

overall though I do love the playbook!!! one of the best tablets I have used overall including comparing to ipad and samsung galaxy. size, platform and functionality are phenomenal!! multitasking is a breeze. new contacts, email, and calendar functions are spot on! for my daily work life a better pdf reader similar to good reader, and cross platform video conferencing support like skype or tango is a must!

I have an iPad (first gen) and I picked up a playbook. and my iPad works substantially better for messaging. I like the messages app(Playbook), but it receives messages slower than my iPad, and the app itself is slower and clunkier to use. By the time it takes me to load my inbox on my Playbook, I could already open up the Mail App (iPad) and be on the first sentence of writing a new email... ><

That frustrates me a little...

Every time I switch back to the messages app, it takes a while to load my messages. I know that its checking for new mail, but couldn't it at least load the already pushed / downloaded mail that should be available locally to the Playbook?

I have had 2.0 now for 2 day performance is generally good ,better than before but on the down side its still not possible( stand alone) to use BBM, to sync my calender and emails to my BES ( except through the Bridge), NO SKYPE!!! and No netflix ! I use my playbook primarily for business and I works great as a Blackberry phone attachment but the "new " and old apps are sadly lacking as compared to whats available for the Ipad. Im equally surprised a number of app I use on my phone ( bold 9800) are't available for the playbook

Love it - with the help of the great posters on this board, got my Telus email to work, and used the developer tricks to add some great Android based apps. Anyone who bought a $199, $249 or $299 Playbook, received this great update, and STILL complains has no brain for value. I've had every iPad and gizmo around - for value for $$$, the Playbook is incredible! LOVE IT!

I'm a BES user, so the update is more of a whimper than a bang for me since native email, calendar and contacts are useless in BES context. I like the fact that you can finally delete Youtube history and the remote control feature is kind of neat, but it would be better if it worked the other way so that I could see the phone screen on the Playbook to check/send SMS, etc. I'm looking forward to side-loading some Android apps, but other than that - while definitely an improvement, this is not as much of game changer as I hoped it would be.

Way to go RIM! I've had the iPad and everything under the sun and I LOVE MY PlayBook. I don't know how can anyone complain but everyone has a different experience I guess. Personally, I do not need 1000 useless apps that do the same thing... I have what I truly use and need in my PlayBook and much more.

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